A Clinical Research Center for Communication Disorders in Children will be established within the Department of Otorhinolaryngology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. The Clinical Research Center will be formed from members of the department and other individuals working with the department presently engaged in clinical investigations in the area of children's communicative disorders. Each project examines a specific aspect of children's hearing loss and/or speech and language abnormalities. The overall purpose of the Center is to provide information to prevent, cure, or care for hearing loss and/or speech and language disorders in children. The data collected will give information heretofore unavailable on: 1) the incidence and prevalence of hearing losses (mild to profound) in high-risk infants, including those from middle ear effusion (MEE) and the effect of hearing loss on speech and language for this high-risk group; 2) the correlation of behavioral and electrophysiological responses in infants; 3) the acoustic properties of the external ears of children from 0 to 6 years of age; 4) the effect of less-than-profound hearing loss on speech and language in 4 to 8 year old children; and 5) the characteristics of cortical responses to speech in children with language deficits. The Clinical Research Center will provide clinical research training for students, residents, fellows, and junior faculty in Otorhinolaryngology.